The best public beach I have seen! The sand is great, not to many rocks or shells, there are some spots with coral and rocks closer to the port end of the beach and many people brought their own snorkeling equipment to check out some of the coves. There are private homes and hotels along the beach but unlike others, they have not sectioned off portions for themselves so you can walk from end to end. It is best to get near the hotels, but the closer you get to the hotels the more crowded it gets as well. From the port it is walkable, just hang a left on the main road (church street) and start walking, it took about 35 minutes to walk to a suitable place to layout, we were by the Quality Suites hotel, the closest one to the port.

There were places to rent snorkeling equipment, jet skis, and other water sports places all along the walk and down the beach as well. The hotel bars and restaurants were all accessible from the beach to get something to eat. One of the strangest things were noticed was that many of the people working at the hotels and restaurants were Canadian, not many Cayman natives or British (as the island is British). Overall at great place to relax for a few hours if you don't want to spend money or do any shore excursions, and you get the great Caribbean beach views and bright blue water.

Be warned the cruise ships dock in town on Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday and the shops are packed with tourists looking for deals. We were given the tip to avoid the town these days and it paid off as there was little traffic and the stores were not congested. We weren’t much up for shopping – we figured we could get just about everything we wanted/needed back home.

We did find a nice shop in the south part of Georgetown called Pure Art. This little house has been converted to a shop selling local art from Cayman Island residents and other nearby Caribbean islands. It’s a very quaint shop with LOTS of little treasures.

Also, just south of Georgetown on our way back to the East Side, we found a small deserted beach with dock near the Queen's Monument in the South Sound (just south of the airport).

A 10-minute ride away from Georgetown, 7 Mile Beach is really lovely. Despite having three ships in port, the beach was not crowded (most people probably went on excursions). Now, this is not really a palm-tree-lined beach - it is more of a big stretch of sand surrounded by pines, flowers and bushes. And those pines seem to attract a lot of visitors, since we were entertained by some songbirds. Which are numerous and very vocal. The water was warm and calm, the sun was playing peek-a-boo with the clouds… a nice place for a beach day. Justin and I will soon go on our "coral hunt" (don’t worry folks, I’m talking about dead coral). We never really were into the "bring a souvenir T-shirt" thing. We like to bring things that are really part of our destination. And since Grand Cayman is made of limestone, we will bring back coral and seashells.

The 7 Mile Beach on Grand Cayman is fabulous. Relaxing in the lounge chair on the beach was wonderful and I didn't want to get back on the ship. The beach is very clean.

At 8am, we drove past the beach area and noted that there were people raking seaweed and overall doing a great job of maintaining the beach, which looked wonderful when we returned at 10am to relax. The long stretch of white sand is comfortable for strolling several miles, but there are a few places you need to watch for small to mid-size pebbles.

The public area was very crowded (probably because several of the cruise ship excursions were cancelled), but not so overcrowded that you couldn't unwind and forget about your troubles. There were several areas along our mile-long stroll, where there were few to no people.

The water is crystal clear and a beautiful turquoise color similar to what one would find in St. John or Turks and Caicos. My father went snorkelling, but didn't see any fish, although closer to the other end of the beach is supposed to have good snorkelling and there were a few tours that left right from the public beach area.

I can't wait to return to the Cayman Islands in 2005 when I will get to spend a week, rather than just a portion of a day on the wonderful island.